Day #2 of 31 Days to Build a Better Blog. The task: write a list post. I just did that yesterday, in fact I did it on both my blogs. But I feel like I should do it with conscious intent, after reading the tips and instructions, so here comes another one! I’ve had this one waiting in my mental queue for a while anyway.

My assortment of seeds (these are just the edibles) - to me this represents true wealth!

A few weeks ago (in January to be precise), some colleagues and I got together and ordered seeds from several catalogs together, thinking we’d share them and save some money. While shelling out $60 bucks for seeds didn’t feel like saving to me, that’s just my eyes being WAY bigger than my stomach. Or than my raised beds. The process was lots of fun, the comeraderie was great, and we all have some great seeds to experiment with this year! Next up: summer potluck and fall harvest party…

Seed Savers Exchange (a most wonderful non-profit in Iowa with fabulous educational programs and a very virtuous mission)

The Cook’s Garden (the most expensive by quite a bit, but also had a few of the fun lettuces and other rare items that others didn’t)

Baker Creek Heirloom Seed Company (by far the best deals, seed packets were only around $2 for most varieties; the catalog was a blast to look at with giant color photos and truly quirky characters scattered throughout. This one was a favorite!!)

The seeds (perhaps I shall number them, just to see how out of hand things got with the ordering):

I guess 32 seed packets, even if you are splitting some of them two or three ways, can’t help but add up to $60+… But here’s the kicker: that’s just the new seeds. Anything I had from last year or the year before I kept and am hoping to reuse as well. I’m learning the hard way, right now, that green onion seeds don’t keep. However, spinach seeds from 2007 are sprouting just fine, as are others (chard, radishes). So here is what I STILL HAVE in my collection; I tossed anything that was more than 2 years old:

Butternut squash (didn’t go last year either, but I’m too much of a sucker to toss the seeds; must try again)

Melody spinach

Mesclun mix

Mache

Mizuna (bought last year, planted for the first time this year)

Lettuce: Paris Island Cos

Lettuce: Buttercrunch

Alaska peas

Edamame (bought last year, never planted)

Green onions (Evergreen bunching)

Squash: early yellow straightneck

Hybrid Ambassador zucchini

Italian Striped zucchini

Squash: Early white bush scallop

Vanilla Ice sunflower

Red Sun sunflower

Lemon gem marigold

Collard greens

Long Island Improved Brussel sprouts

Cosmic Purple carrot

Cucumber: Tasty green burpless

Rainbow Swiss Chard (bought last year to replenish my dwindling stock of this favorite plant; heaven forbid I should actually run out of a packet and not have a backup already on hand!)

Bok Choy (bought last year but never planted)

Notice I did NOT number those, because I don’t want to know. A lot of these are duplicates – seeds for which I bought replacements before I ran out of the first packet – or veggies I tried two years ago but didn’t do last year, and still haven’t had the heart to toss. A lot of them were stars in the garden last year, I just didn’t use up the packet and I can’t wait to use the rest of the seeds this year. (in that category the notables are collards, cucumbers, chard, and all the lettuces).

How do I organize all of these vast quantities of seeds? (never mind where I will plant them all – I’ll try to illustrate that somehow in another post). I keep them in a bamboo drawer organizer that was intended for sorting silverware. Each narrow compartment is perfect for standing several seed packets upright in, in little groups next to each other, so the whole entity looks like fairly neat little rows that I can easily flip through to find what I want. Geek that I am, I have organized them by plant family (brassicas, legumes, etc) – sort of – with the flowers all in one stack and the herbs all in another.

This terrible cameraphone shot shows the compartments a little better...

I was going to get into what I’ve already planted out into the garden and what’s in a seed tray getting moved back and forth from garden (day) to house (night) but it seems I’ve written a pretty long post already. I’ll stop here, and continue that thought another day!

I love making lists. I love that making lists is an acceptable way to blog, and not just some kind of laziness…